Sunday, December 26, 2010

Reflecting on the GAME Plan Part 1

Throughout this eight week course, I must say that I have learned a great deal about how to implement and utilize technology in my classroom while learning how to create meaningful projects that address content standards.  The next step is taking what I have learned to create lessons and projects that my students will be responsible for doing in the upcoming semester.  Although I wish the timing of this class would have been at a different time because of my focus on finishing grading, creating final exams, and planning review sessions for my students.  I feel that my time could have been better managed to focus on my GAME plan goals, but life happens.

At the beginning of the course, I set two goals for myself.  First, I wanted to facilitate and inspire student learning and creativity by utilizing what I have learned from this course to promote, support, and model creative and innovative thinking through technology.  Part of this goal will be achieved when the dynamic of the classroom changes.  For example, no matter what the lesson, teachers and educators have to change the perspective of education.  In order to achieve this, teachers must be able to facilitate self-directed learning where students want to learn.  By creating meaningful and content based projects while utilizing technology, this can hopefully be achieved.  We have to continue to set goals for our own education and also teach goal-setting to our students as well (Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer, 2009).

However, all educators know that there are other students that contain these creative skills, talents, and abilities and perhaps might not know what they are or know and might not care.  But, creative thinking in the classroom truly defines ownership when it comes to learning in the classroom.  Students learn about themselves and the process of learning rather than just from the content (Laureate, 2010a).  Creative learners think outside of the box, formulate problem solving skills, and find ways to display their knowledge while using a variety of technology, such as the use of music, film, video, music, or any type of art (Laureate, 2010).  This relates to the classroom simply because this type of learner needs an outlet to express what they have learned and usually do so in a manner that is very unique and creative.
The use of technology in the classroom is huge.  Since I began this Master’s Program, I was always interested in finding ways to become a better teacher in the classroom and integrating technology is definitely a step in the right direction.  Integrating technology in the classroom is important because it promotes authentic learning (Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer, 2009).  By giving students a choice of how to display their information for a project, technology is almost always being used.  Whether they are creating a blog, a wiki, social networking, using technological devices such as smart phones or lap tops, students will also be more inclined to complete the project if there is an element of technology simply because they will find it more appealing to their individual learning style (Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer, 2009).  Students could also find other uses of technology to help teachers integrate the content or communicate with students all contributing to the education process.
My second goal for my GAME Plan is similar to my first goal but focuses more on creating assessments and projects, utilizing technology, and integrating solid content into the learning for my students.  The content of any project is the most important.  What do we want our students to learn?  This is the plan of action or the goals we want to create for our students, which coincides with the curriculum and the standards (Cennamo, Ross, & Ertmer, 2009).  By utilizing creativity and combining that with technology and the content, the project will be a success and may have more of an impact on the learning of a student.  For instance, a student will take the content of the research and find ways to creatively display those ideas.  Again, this allows students to learn 21st century skills, an opportunity to share their creativity, and find success in the classroom by learning the content.  Although I feel that I have done a great deal of work to achieve this goal, this is going to be an ongoing process.   

No comments:

Post a Comment